The following article mentions mental health struggles.
Princess Diana’ssudden death in a car crash in 1997 stunned the world.
Her heartbreaking death spurred a frenzy of media speculation and public mourning.
“Twelve years old.
Sort of 7, 7:30 in the morning, early.
I couldn’t believe,” he told Anderson Cooper in a 2023 episode of “60 Minutes.”
He recalled in his memoir, “Spare,” “He says, ‘They tried, darling boy.
I’m afraid she didn’t make it.’
These phrases remain in my mind like darts on a board.”
“Pa didn’t hug me.
He wasn’t great at showing emotions under normal circumstances.
But after that, nothing was okay for a long time,” he wrote in “Spare.”
“Never shed a single tear at that point,” Harry said on “60 Minutes.”
“I was in shock, you know?”
He even had a recurring dream about Diana reemerging without warning.
“She was always wearing a disguise a big blond wig.
Or big black sunglasses,” he wrote.
“And yet I’d always recognize her.”
“There was never another time.”
And this left him with a lasting sense of guilt.
“Their hands were wet from wiping their own tears away.
This could have been motivated in part by overwhelm.
So rather than facing down his anger and sadness about his mother’s death, he pushed it down.
As he said on his Apple TV+ series, “I just decided not to talk about it.”
Even before his mother’s death, Harry felt traumatized by invasive and unwanted media attention.
He remembered wishing he could do something to stop this dangerous and aggressive behavior.
Sadly, the paparazzi never relented and continued to chase the beloved princess.
“That happened every single day until the day she died,” the prince said.
“In Harry’s mind, it was the press that killed his mother.
The quick trip through the tunnel proved anticlimactic.
But the lip was nothing.
We barely felt it,” he wrote in “Spare.”
They drove through the tunnel a second time, but once again, nothing clicked.
If anything, it only made him feel worse.
“It had been a very bad idea.
But the prince could only keep up the act for so long.
By his late 20s, he was at a breaking point, and started experiencing panic attacks.
Before I even left the house I was pouring with sweat.
I was in fight or flight mode,” he said on “The Me you might’t See.”
He eventually turned to drugs and alcohol.
Harry struggled in silence throughout his youth.
Early on in his relationship with Meghan Markle, he dove even further into his mental health journey.
Still, the death of their mother was difficult and traumatic for both brothers.
It also made them both aware of the importance of mental health and of processing their emotions.
Someone has to take the lead and be brave enough to force that conversation.”
And, of course, it meant never airing the family’s dirty laundry.
… Its mystery is its life.
This was exactly what King Charles III tried to do after the sudden death of Princess Diana.
But he refused to share or discuss any other details with Prince Harry or his brother.
“No newspapers no television and sadly very little discussion about their late mother.
Charles thought that was the right thing to do,” royal expert Ingrid Seward told theIrish Mirror.
“He blamed his father.
